Michael,
Many people in this thread have expressed deep, sincere concern, and they are asking for thoughtful answers in reply to their questions. If Christ is still your Lord and Savior, please answer them, and let no division among us be a shameful display of broken fellowship in the Body.
I add a few of my own questions, taken mostly from my response to you in the Islam thread a few weeks back. Forgive me if that post was long-winded or confusing, but I would truly like to hear your thoughts on the following:
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...if Allah was alone before the creation of angels, of men, of subatomic particles; and if he is always and ever alone by virtue of his very essence, then that state of loneliness and self-love is, in fact, the ideal toward which we should strive. Shouldn't we desire to imitate our god and master?
One might say that Allah did require an object for his great love, a vessel to receive the outpouring of his eternal benevolence. But if god needs his creation in order to express his nature and complete the image of his personal being, then isn't the creation itself equally deified? In its very conception it also conceives and sustains its creator, fulfilling his great need in a moment of frustrated omnipotence. He exercised no freedom of will in his act of creation: sheer, deterministic necessity drove him to it. And yet if his existence as god is disqualified without his creation, how could he even be said to exist apart from it?
How would the image of the eternal hermit be expressed in the mirror of creation? Certainly not in love, friendship, charity, and sacrifice, nor in hatred, greed, vice, and treachery; for all of these demonstrate a distinction between harmony and disharmony, between cooperation and contradiction. Before a relationship can exist- whether it is between a proton and electron or between Creator and creature - there must first be a distinction in diversity and a reconciliation in unity. This relationship must find its source in the relationship of God in Himself.
But if our god is Allah and all things flow from the simplicity of his oneness, why do the categories of different and same co-exist? And why do we live and act at all times with a rationale that is justified by the union of diversity?
Michael, please tell us... do you believe that God is love? I do. And that is why I am making my best, human effort to love you with these words and my prayers: because God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit has loved us first, with an ineffable love that expresses His very essence. And it is Him that we must serve, trust, and magnify in all things. Our Lord is Jesus Christ, the Word made flesh, the way, the truth, and the life- and you cannot know the Father apart from Him.
Please don't be afraid to admit ignorance or frailty of faith: we are all plagued by the same weakness. But it is only in recognizing this fact, and then submitting ourselves to the instruction of the Holy Spirit in Christ's Church, that we can rejoice in our brokenness and find strength apart from ourselves. Remember the words of the Holy and All-laudable Apostle St. Paul in 2 Corinthians 12:7-10:
7 And lest I should be exalted above measure by the abundance of the revelations, a thorn in the flesh was given to me, a messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I be exalted above measure. 8 Concerning this thing I pleaded with the Lord three times that it might depart from me. 9 And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. 10 Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
Grace and peace be with you, brother.
Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on us sinners!
